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The development of a vaccine to prevent Ebola virus disease will be accelerated with support from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response. Under a one-year contract with Profectus BioSciences Inc., ASPR’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority will provide approximately $5.8 million in funding ...

With the recent news of a Dallas nurse being infected with the Ebola virus, hospitals across the U.S. are scrambling to prepare for a potential outbreak of the deadly disease. In this interview with Surgical Products, Martie Moore, RN, MAOM, CPHQ and chief nursing officer of Medline Industries, Inc., provides insight into how hospitals and medical supply manufacturers are preparing for a possible Ebola outbreak ...

Although recent trends show a decline in anesthesia-related deaths, a study published today by the Journal of Healthcare Risk Management concludes that risks are evolving and both physicians and patients can take steps to reduce injuries ...

Have you wondered why Ebola patients are being sent to Omaha, Nebraska? It’s because one physician, Dr. Philip Smith, had the foresight to set up the Nebraska Biocontainment Patient Care Unit after the 9/11 attacks as a bulwark against bioterrorism ...

New Ebola research demonstrates that quick and forceful implementation of control interventions are necessary to control outbreaks and avoid far worse scenarios. Researchers analyzed up-to-date epidemiological data of Ebola cases in Nigeria as of Oct. 1, 2014, in order to estimate the case fatality rate, proportion of health care workers infected, transmission progression and impact of control interventions on the size of the epidemic ...

Professor Myron M. Levine, MD, Director of the Center for Vaccine Development (CVD) at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and UM SOM Dean E. Albert Reece MD, PhD, MBA, announced that the CVD, in conjunction with its sister institution, The Center for Vaccine Development of Mali and the Ministry of Health of Mali, have begun a clinical trial in health care workers to evaluate a promising experimental Ebola vaccine ...

National guidelines for the cleaning of certain gastrointestinal (GI) scopes are likely to be updated due to findings from UPMC's infection prevention team. The research and updated disinfection technique will be shared Saturday in Philadelphia at ID Week 2014, an annual meeting of health professionals in infectious disease fields ...

Even if they don't show signs of infection, college athletes who play football, soccer and other contact sports are more likely to carry the superbug methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), suggests a study on MRSA and athletes, which is being presented at IDWeek 2014™. This puts them at higher risk for infection and increases the likelihood of spreading the bug, which can cause serious and even fatal infections ...

Beyond the death toll from Ebola across West Africa the outbreak of the deadly virus has also caused serious complications to the provisions of other types of health care. People seeking access to health care for treatment of malaria cannot get help, pregnant women cannot get assistance delivering babies, and people cannot get access to routine immunizations ...

Once again, the medical community is taking notice of a highly contagious pathogen arising in Africa and potentially threatening all of mankind. The Ebola virus has now caused a very real pandemic that is wiping out villages and rapidly crossing borders in African nations. Those nations’ public health and social resources are challenge by this dangerous, aggressive killer ...

Numerous experts and policy makers have called for hospitals to screen patients for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections and isolate anyone testing positive to prevent the spread of these so-called "Superbugs" in healthcare settings. Several states have enacted laws requiring patients be screened for MRSA upon admission ...

Ethicon, Inc. announced results of a large, retrospective study that showed the use of the SURGICEL® Family of Topical Absorbable Hemostats was associated with lower costs, reduced product usage, shortened length of hospital stay, and reduced transfusions compared to the use of other adjunctive hemostats.

Here are the top five things the Center for Disease Control is doing to help prevent the spread of the ebola virus. Texas health officials have confined four people to their home, under guard, after they had close contact with an Ebola patient in Dallas.

Physicians have long speculated at the hard-to-treat nature of joint infection. In an article published in Journal of Infectious Diseases, Thomas Jefferson University scientists, in collaboration with scientists at the National Institutes of Health, come one step closer to understanding why these infections are so tough to tackle.

Sterilization wrap has come a long way since it was first introduced more than 85 years ago to maintain sterility for surgical instruments and devices. Now Medline is introducing Gemini wrap, the next generation of sterilization wrap shown to have greater material strength than the competition to ensure the integrity of the sterilization process.

The project's goal was to reduce the cardiac NSQIP SSI rate to two percent. The team succeeded in lowering the infection rate to a NSQIP average of 1.6 percent in the nine months after fully instituting the surgical best practices bundle.

West Virginia's state epidemiologist said an investigation found that the clinic reused syringes on more than one patient, surgical masks were not worn during epidural injections, and that the facility had other sanitation and hygiene issues.

July 24, 2014 11:54 am |
by Hadiza S. Kazaure, M.D., of the Stanford University School of Medicine, and Colleagues |
News |
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A postoperative pneumonia prevention program for patients in the surgical ward at a California Veterans Affairs hospital lowered the case rate for the condition. Pneumonia is a common infection that accounts for about 15 percent of all hospital-acquired infections and as much as 3.4 percent of complications among surgical patients.

The study examined the Hawthorne effect, also known as observation bias (the tendency of people to change their behavior when they are aware of an observer) using an electronic monitoring hand hygiene system in real-time. Ultrasound "tags" on soap dispensers transmitted a signal to a nearby receiver each time the levers were pushed, and a time-stamped hand hygiene wash was recorded.